Lost in Translation

The air in the small, cluttered shop was thick with the scent of aging paper and something else, something faintly sweet and earthy, like dried flowers pressed between pages for decades. Eleanor breathed it in, a familiar comfort that always settled the restless flutter in her chest. Dust motes danced in the single shaft of sunlight that pierced the gloom from the narrow window, illuminating stacks of books that threatened to spill onto the narrow aisles. Mr. Abernathy, a man whose tweed jacket seemed to have absorbed the very essence of his shop, peered at her over spectacles perched precariously on the end of his nose.

“Another afternoon lost in the stacks, Eleanor?” His voice was a gentle rumble, like pebbles shifting at the bottom of a stream.

Eleanor offered a small smile, her fingers tracing the spine of a leather-bound volume. “They’re not lost, Mr. Abernathy. They’re found. Or perhaps I’m being found by them.”